Policy Exchange, a favoured think tank of David Cameron, believes that the decline of shipping and manufacturing means former coastal strongholds are doomed, and that costly regeneration across the cities should be abandoned. Moreover, they've advocated a mass migration southward (a policy favoured by such patriarchal plutocrats as Stalin and Saddam Hussein) with residents upping sticks to London and the south-east, and planned investment in their former homes ploughed into an additional 3 million houses down this way. Liverpool's current status as European Capital of Culture hasn't stopped them from sticking a fork in the North and declaring it done.

The entire scheme is risible, and a sound advertisement for the utter pointlessness of think tanks. David Cameron will no doubt be cursing Policy Exchange, founded by fellow Tory MP and current Shadow Secretary for Children, Schools and Families Michael Gove, as he heads today for the north-west to campaign in marginal seats.

The Tories have scorned the findings, as has with the government and local authorities. Boris Johnson, meanwhile, is likely to be particularly incensed by a plan that advocates people he is not too fond of moving here en masse.